Mr. Doomsday

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrived at the Pentagon as a man who matched the times, a shrewd insider Democrats viewed as possessing the will and the weight to tame the sprawling defense budget.

But in only a few short months, Panetta has emerged instead as Washington’s sharpest critic of further cuts — an unexpected Mr. Doomsday of the supercommittee deficit drama.

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He has angered Democrats by urging Congress to whack Social Security and Medicare before touching defense again. He drew scorn from liberal and conservative analysts alike for predicting a 1-point hike in the unemployment rate if the supercommittee deadlocks and the Pentagon loses $600 billion in funding. And he has delighted Republicans with his constant, cataclysmic warnings about the perils of trimming even one more dollar from the defense budget.

The no-holds-barred approach may boost Panetta within the five walls of the Pentagon, but it’s making life difficult for President Barack Obama by aggravating the Democratic base, which views the party’s elder statesman as providing political cover to Republicans intent on shielding defense and slashing domestic programs.

“That is not the Leon Panetta, the budget guy, that I once knew,” Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) told POLITICO. “He knows better.”

Panetta’s hard line is drawing notice because of the pedigree of the messenger. He possesses a rare commodity in Washington: bipartisan street cred.

He is revered within the Democratic Party, as a former House Budget Committee chairman and budget director and White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton. But he earned the respect of Republicans as the CIA chief who finally brought down Osama bin Laden. And the military interests he represents are rivaled only by the health care industry in terms of lobbying power on Capitol Hill.

It’s a powerful mix that positions Panetta as one of the most influential figures trying to shape the supercommittee deliberations — much to the annoyance of liberals, fiscal hawks and libertarians who view the Pentagon budget as ripe for deficit savings.

His old Democratic colleagues on Capitol Hill say the resistance on deeper defense cuts is out of character, but they get why he’s doing it: A softer position would neuter him within the Pentagon.

“I’m amused because I remember Leon Panetta when he was chairman of the Budget Committee in the House and the head of the Office of Management and Budget, and he always said, ‘We’ve got to cut, we’ve got to cut, we’ve got to reduce the deficit,’ and that was before the deficit ballooned under President [George W.] Bush,” Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) said. “He’s taking the view of the Department of Defense and the military. I understand where he is coming from, even though I am amused by it.”